Higher-order corrections for $tqZ$ production

Abstract

We present theoretical results for the associated production of a single top quark and a $Z$ boson ($tqZ$ production) at LHC energies. We calculate higher-order corrections from soft-gluon emission for this process. We compute the approximate NNLO (aNNLO) cross section at LHC energies, including uncertainties from scale dependence and from parton distributions. We also calculate the top-quark rapidity distribution. The aNNLO corrections are significant and enhance the NLO cross section, and their inclusion provides a more precise theoretical prediction.